Brodie Panlock 2006 suicide victim

Nicholas Smallwood, convicted bully

Betty Dukes at SCOTUS

The June 20, 2011 Supreme Court decision in the Wal-Mart v. Dukes case (1) insulted any worker who dares complain about discriminatory mistreatment at work, (2) made it harder for individuals to join together for lawsuit efficiency in a class action to go up against a behemoth multinational employing corporation, (3) ignored and rewrote a 45-year legal precedent, and (4) cemented Justice Scalia and the conservative block’s motivation to serve corporate interests over those of ordinary working Americans.

Betty Dukes, in 2000, claimed that she had been denied promotion to higher-paying jobs. The incident that provoked the lawsuit was when she needed change to make a small purchase during her break. She asked a friend to open a cash register with a one-cent transaction, a common practice, according to Dukes. For that act she was demoted and had a humiliating cut in pay, accused by Wal-Mart management of misconduct. She still works as a greeter at the Pittsburg, California store. She is also an ordained Baptist minister of a local church. Ms. Magazine named her one of its Women of the Year in 2004. As of May 2010, at age 60, she still lived with her mother because her Wal-Mart hourly wage of $15.23 did not allow her to own a home of her own.

Dukes’ attorney was Brad Seligman, of the Impact Fund in Berkeley, California. The lawsuit with Dukes as one of six lead plaintiffs was filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco in 2001. Despite the strain that such a lawsuit has caused its namesake, Dukes said, “In this life you have to stand up or be trampled.”

Corporate Ally

Scalia, writing for the 5-4 majority to strike down the class action suit against giant retailer Wal-Mart, said that because Wal-Mart has an official corporate policy that gender discrimination is prohibited (p. 13 in the decision) and because penalties are presumably imposed for violating the policy, discrimination does not occur at Wal-Mart that can be characterized as pattern and practice.

The majority of justices considered credible Wal-Mart’s claim that they did not discriminate because they said so and had a policy on the books. We agree that a policy, a line drawn in the sand, is the requisite starting point for any workplace culture that intends to treat workers fairly. But to argue that the policy’s presence on the books alone is sufficient is naive. Scalia is not stupid. He and the other corporatists on the Supreme Court simply want to ignore complaining employees as whiners not deserving respect.

This Scalia point is the least legalistic of the several arguments to find in favor or Wal-Mart. It is the HR argument. Recently, a Ventura County (CA) grand jury found evidence of bullying and harassment of employees by management. The HR director, John Nicoll, challenged the evidence by stating that the county has a policy and that he would be shocked if bullying really did happen.

Nicoll, and SCOTUS justices Scalia, Roberts, Kennedy, Thomas and Alito all want us to believe that employers do not lie, never deprive workers of their rights, always follow state and federal laws, and always know best. To challenge the corporate line is wrong. The majority of the current Supreme Court is an “HR dream team.”

Wal-Mart is especially happy with the decision that it failed to win in the federal trial court or the Court of Appeals. Luckily the firm saved their pennies so they could take their case to the one place where they had powerful legal allies willing to protect them and other poor defenseless and largest employers in the U.S.

Gisel Ruiz, Vice President of People (not the magazine, rather the slaves that work for her), Walmart U.S. officially gloated that the SCOTUS decision “pulls the rug out from under the accusations made against Walmart over the last 10 years. Every female associate and every customer can feel even better about the company as a result of today’s decision.” Ruiz feels better, why don’t you?

For their investment, Wal-Mart, on behalf of all corporations, will also benefit from Scalia and the Court conservatives decision to rewrite law. Class action lawsuits are governed by Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The Rule, prior to June 20, established a low threshold for groups of employees suffering at the hands of a single employer to file a common lawsuit. Many were discriminated against at Wal-Mart, a single employer. Hence the class action.

Scalia and the cons changed the Rule 23 standard to now require groups of plaintiffs to show that they were harmed by the same boss or the same biased employee test, not simply employed by the same corporation with an overarching pattern and practice of misconduct. Wal-Mart’s defense in the Dukes case was that the corporation gives latitude to individual store managers to make local decisions. That dispersion of responsibility was enough to kill the claim of commonality across all Wal-Mart stores for Scalia.

One far-reaching (too “far reaching” according to dissenting Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan) implication of Scalia’s judicial lawmaking — the revision of what defines commonality — will be to force each individual worker to file an expensive lawsuit against the giant employer. Employers will find it even easier now to squash cases with motions for summary judgment or prolonged procedures that bankrupt individuals. The original Rule 23 sought to minimize taxpayer-paid public court expenses. Now smaller and more frequent cases without access to class action status will cost government more without putting a dent in the coffers of giant corporations.

Scalia managed to deal a blow to government at a time of great fiscal pressure and to shove workers’ demands for dignity aside.

Another implication is that the merits of the case must be shown to a judge by plaintiffs before having the case certified as eligible for class action status. In Wal-Mart v. Dukes, the legal proceedings all centered on the applicability of class action status. The case itself was never tried.

Employers have little to fear from employment lawsuits anyway. The Ashley Alford case is the exception, not a regular outcome. Thanks to Scalia and his cohorts in the majority, employers will have it easier.

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The two major flaws of existing anti-discrimination laws are: (1) that they fail to cover incidents outside the narrow legal boundaries (victim must be a member of a protected status group while the harasser cannot be, thus 80% of bullied workers cannot rely on existing laws for help), and (2) it is a sick and twisted irony that harassers who torment people across boundaries of age, race, and gender — the equal opportunity abusers — have a legal defense for their misconduct. The final injustice related to the Wal-Mart v. Dukes case is that merits were never debated. The entire 10 year battle was not over whether or not women at Wal-Mart suffered discrimination. It was a technical fight over the legitimacy of filing a class action on behalf of 1.5 million current and former women employees.

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Read the complete SCOTUS decision in the Wal-Mart v. Dukes case decided June 20, 2011.

Here’s the local newspaper account:

Grand jury finds workplace bullying a problem within county government by John Scheibe, Ventura County Star, June 16, 2011

The Ventura County Grand Jury recently concluded that workplace bullying is a problem in county government offices and encouraged county officials to develop a policy against bullying in the workplace.

“Unfortunately, bullying is not limited to schools,” the grand jury stated in a letter released in late May.
The 2010-11 grand jury investigated bullying within county government after getting a complaint about it. As part of this, the grand jury interviewed past and current county employees who were the targets of bullying or witnessed it.

John Nicoll, assistant county executive officer and the director of human resources for the county, said county officials are preparing a response to the grand jury’s report.

“We understand the concerns about conduct like that in the workplace,” Nicoll said.

Grand jurors found employees “were yelled at by managers in group meetings and in public areas.”
Also, employees, including some highly experienced ones, “were excessively monitored by managers to such an extent that they left their positions,” the grand jury’s report stated.

Some employees went to other agencies, while others accepted “a demotion to receive that transfer.”
Others left county government for other jobs or retired earlier than they had planned because of a “manager’s bullying behavior,” the grand jury found.

Some employees were isolated both “organizationally and physically,” the report stated.
The report found the county “has no written policy specifically directed against bullying in the workplace.”
It also found that processes to report workplace bullying “are not trusted by employees because the agency with the alleged bullying issue is allowed to investigate complaints using personnel within its own organization.”

Nicoll said there are mechanisms now in place for county employees to file a complaint if they believe they have been discriminated against.

As to the allegation by the grand jury that county employees have left their jobs because of workplace bullying, Nicoll said he “would be upset if someone were legitimately fleeing the workplace if they felt they were being mistreated” and felt they had no recourse but to leave.

“We do not tolerate employees being mistreated because they’ve filed a complaint,” Nicoll said. “I’m disappointed if someone left for that reason.”

Nicoll said he did not know how widespread a problem workplace bullying is in the county government.
However, he said “the county has gotten very limited number of complaints of inappropriate treatment by their supervisors.”

The Workplace Bullying Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to eradicating workplace bullying through research and education, commissioned a 2010 study that found 35 percent of workers in the United States have experienced bullying firsthand. Men constitute 62 percent of bullies, while women make up 58 percent of the targets of bullying, according to the study. Female bullies target other women 80 percent of the time, according to the study, done by Zogby International. The study found workplace bullying is a silent epidemic since many workers who are victims of it or witness it fail to report it.

The group, which is based in Washington state, defines workplace bullying as repeated, health-harming abusive conduct committed by bosses and co-workers against others. Workplace bullying is legal in many states across the nation, according to the institute. The institute is working to introduce bills in various state legislatures that would make workplace bullying illegal.

The institute also found that workplace bullying costs companies millions of dollars in employee turnover, lost productivity and lawsuits. The grand jury seemed to agree, stating in its report that workplace bullying costs taxpayers additional money because the county must incur the cost of recruiting and training replacement personnel for those who have left their jobs because of bullying. …

The grand jury is recommending the Ventura County Board of Supervisors issue a policy against bullying and collect data “to identify the existence and extent of bullying in branches of county government.”
Such a policy should include descriptions of bullying behaviors to educate employees on unacceptable workplace behaviors and encourage employees to report this type of workplace abuse, the grand jury said.

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READ THE GRAND JURY REPORT

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Solutions for Ventura County can be found in the book The Bully-Free Workplace and at the website for the premier workplace bullying consultants, The Work Doctor®

News from East St. Louis federal District Court: A young woman who was subjected to some of the grossest imaginable humiliation and harassment won a $95 million jury victory. $80 million was for punitive damages against the company, Aaron’s (Rents as in rent-to-own), that earned a profit of only $118 million last year. The jury sent the statement that most of that profit should be turned over to Ashley Alford.

Alford was hired in 2005. In her first year, the sexual jokes and lewd propositions escalated. O’Fallon, IL store manager, Richard Moore, nicknamed her “Trix,” groped her and actually coming up behind her when sitting and hitting her head with his penis. The culminating event was when he threw her to the ground, lifted her shirt, held her down and masturbated on her. He was arrested.

Alford called the corporate harassment hotline in May 2006. She never received a call back. There was no investigation. The assault and battery occurred in October 2006.

The EEOC actually filed the lawsuit in 2008. [Note how egregious and over-the-top the misconduct has to be for the EEOC to act.] Plaintiff Alford joined the case with her private attorney.

The inevitable rollbacks. The jury initially awarded $54 million for Moore violating federal discrimination laws. That award is capped at $600,000 by law.  The rest of the violations — assault and battery (the noted Indiana bullying case was actually decided on an assault charge); negligent supervision (of the store manager by corporate managers; sexual harassment (the classic case of a civil rights violation in this case); and intentional infliction of emotional distress (which is present in most bullying incidents though courts are loathe to consider any conduct by a manager to be sufficiently “outrageous.” It took a male supervisor waving his wang and masturbating on the woman to be considered outrageous!).

In the end, pending appeal, Ashley Alford stands to win $41.6 million for the living hell to which Aaron’s had subjected her.

Anyone know where the former Aaron’s supervisor Richard Moore works now? He still awaits trial for his criminal battery of Alford. Wonder if he had as much trouble finding a job as bullied targets do?

Read the story by Robert Patrick from the June 10, 2011 St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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As we have said repeatedly, justice rarely is found in U.S. courtrooms when the injured plaintiff fights the employer. In fact, listen to plaintiff Becky describe the painful process of taking on the State of California. Though she won a substantial amount of money, it took a ridiculous toll on her family. To listen to the audio, go to this page and scroll down to “So You Wanna Sue …”

Back on March 18, the MA State House passed a version of the bill 148-0 in the aftermath of reports that Irish transplanted high school student Prince was still being mocked long after her death on social media sites by the same teens that had tormented and taunted her right up to her last day of life. A key factor in the South Hadley High story about Prince was that she allegedly reported her fear of being beaten by Flannery Mullins to a school administrator, according to court documents. Mullins, one of six students was subsequently arrested before he was suspended from school. Remarkably, the school superintendent, Gus Sayer, denied any knowledge of her plight prior to a week before her January suicide. This is the same superintendent who had parents demanding accountability removed by police during a televised March school board meeting. Remember that the school superintendent is the CEO of the school district and manages the site administrators, the principals.

The Massachusetts legislature, which ignored the anti-bullying Healthy Workplace Bill SB699 after a committee hearing in 2010, sprang into action belatedly on behalf of students with another unanimous vote, in the Senate, 38-0. Headlines cause reactionary votes.

By April 29, differing House and Senate versions of the bill were reconciled and the bill was sent to the Governor to become law on April 3.  The bill goes into effect during the 2011-12 school year.

The final bill is S2404 and you can read it in its entirety here. The heart of adult responsibility to act and not be passive do-nothing bystanders to student-on-student violence can be found in lines 123-135 of the text. All adult staff have to receive professional development training on recognizing bullying and ways to intervene. The law requires staff to report it to the principal or the school’s designated person. The principal must immediately investigate (no guidelines given).  The principal may, in turn, determine if the acts are criminal and if so, can call law enforcement. Everyone is to be notified — bullied student, accused bully, parents of all involved students.

The law pertains to both public AND private schools in the state.

In the new law, bullying is defined as the “repeated use by one or more students of a written, verbal or electronic expression or a physical act or gesture or any combination thereof, directed at a victim that: (i) causes physical or emotional harm to the victim or damage to the victim’s property; (ii) places the victim in reasonable fear of harm to himself or of damage to his property; (iii) creates a hostile environment at school for the victim; (iv) infringes on the rights of the victim at school; or (v) materially and substantially disrupts the education process or the orderly operation of a school … shall include cyber-bullying.”

For an enlightened view of how adult bullying affects student safety, read Dr. Spencer’s essay written exclusively for WBI — Stealing From Children.

The bill is not a feel-good bill for everyone. Proponents say it will allow physically abusive bullies to be held accountable. Opposition stems mainly from attorneys who warn the law may not pass constitutional muster. For example, many times parents of accused BULLIES have won lawsuits against school districts because their little bundle of joy is entitled to her or his freedom of speech.

This flies in the face of common sense in a world where the BULLIED are persecuted even worse when they expose the suffering endured at the hands of the unfettered expression of bullies’ speech. Where is the freedom to call for relief from persecution? Not only is this speech not protected, it leads to serious harm.

I had the occasion to hear Pepperdine University Law Professor Bernie James speak at a school bullying conference. His review of several court cases revealed that most state anti-bullying laws for kids do little to protect the bullied in that school districts are NEVER held accountable. So, just having a law is insufficient when the law is weak. Injustice is compounded when the BULLIES are given more rights by courts.

The law against workplace bullying (psychological harassment) in the province of Quebec is weak. A friend of ours who worked very hard for its enactment acknowledges the lack of employer sanctions in the law, but believes that at least the government there once upon a time declared that citizens deserve to work free of abuse.

That sentiment may be the best we can hope for from the Massachusetts law. It would be an improvement to have the law hold the district superintendents responsible for preventing and correcting bullying among students. That way, the CEO’s job depends on it.

Of course, the ideal solution would address the bullying among adults in schools where apparently the only focus is on the students.

Only two school districts have directly addressed the adult-adult problem. They have implemented the WBI/Work Doctor Blueprint to Prevent Workplace Bullying. They are Sioux City, Iowa and Desert Sands in La Quinta, California.

Gillman had closed the plant in Dec. 2008 without notice or the severance pay due to 240 union workers (represented by the United Electrical Radio and Machine Workers of America – UE). The Dec 5-11 sit-in by the union inspired the nation partly because Bank of America (on the heels of the initial bank bailout) was tarnished as the greedy bank that kept a good-guy CEO from meeting payroll.

Diligent union sit-in members found Gillman to much less than honest. He was a crook who knew his factory would have to shut down but did not tell creditors or employees. He ordered the trucking of equipment from his Illinois union shop to his non-union Iowa factory. Union members trailed the trailers. (Saving the equipment enabled Serious Materials, a California firm, to buy the factory.)

That sit-in is memorialized in Michael Moore’s film Capitalism: A Love Story.  During the sit-in, Gillman could not access his office for documents. It was those documents that led to his being charged with defrauding creditors of over $10 million and using the money for paying off two luxury cars and not paying employees their $2 million. Gillman is charged with 8 counts of felony theft, fraud and money laundering through two shell corporations. His bail was set at $10 million.

Telling remarks from the union about the arrest, “Corruption and abuse of workers rights is rampant in corporate America.  Very often where you see violations of workers rights there are other corporate crimes and poor conditions as well … we all hope that this is the beginning of more bosses being held accountable for their crimes against workers.”

Let us hope that accountability can be restored for many more executives.

by Dee McAree
The National Law Journal
11-11-2002

A case in which an employee charged that he was retaliated against for taking time off under the Family Medical Leave Act to care for his aging parents has triggered an $11.65 million award.

The recent Chicago verdict — one of the largest won under FMLA — is just one of many that employment lawyers say they expect to see as baby boomers are faced with the predicament of caring for aging parents. In 1998, Chris Schultz, a 25-year veteran employee of Christ Hospital and Medical Center in Oak Lawn, Ill., was the esteemed “MVP Employee” with his picture hanging in the hospital lobby.

But two years later, he was out of a job. Lawyers for the 45-year-old Schultz sued the hospital in Schultz v. Advocate Health, No. 01C-0702 (N.D. Ill. June 5, 2002), claiming that he was unfairly penalized for taking time off to care for his aging parents.

Schultz, who worked in maintenance, was entitled to take 12 weeks intermittently over the course of a year after his request for family medical leave was granted in 2000.

At the time, he was caring for his father, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease, and his ailing mother, who eventually died later that year. During the course of his leave, hospital supervisors instituted a monthly performance policy that graded maintenance employees by the amount of work they had completed within a set period of time. It was this system that led to trouble.

Schultz’s lawyer, Charles Siedlecki, a Chicago-area solo practitioner, argued that the hospital’s grading policy punished employees who had been granted legitimate time off, including those on sick or disability leave. “You can’t hold people accountable for work when they are not there to do it,” said Siedlecki. He argued the case with co-counsel John P. DeRose, a solo based in Hinsdale, Ill.

Joan E. Gale, a member of Chicago’s Seyfarth Shaw, led the defense for the hospital. Gale did not return calls for comment.

After a seven-day trial and eight hours of deliberations, a jury of four men and four women awarded $10.75 million against Advocate Health and Hospitals Corp, which owns Christ Hospital.

Additional awards of $450,000 each were levied against two supervisors. The issue of equitable damages remains before U.S. District Senior Judge Milton Shadur of the Northern District of Illinois, who could opt to award “liquid damages,” or twice the total amount of front and backpay.

Steve Platt, president of the Illinois chapter of the National Employment Lawyers Association and a partner at Chicago’s Arnold & Kadjan, expects to see more FMLA claims against employers as baby boomers face the predicament of caring for aging parents.

Platt said he would be hard-pressed to point to another FMLA verdict as high as this one, and speculates that the jury’s reaction was an emotional one.

“There’s a certain amount of equity in the drama of a courtroom and juries don’t always decide things based on jury instructions or the law,” Platt said. “If they see [an employer doing] something that isn’t fair, they’re going to hit you for it.”

An FMLA claim on its own would not have produced such a high verdict, said Siedlecki. “Under FMLA, the most you can get is liquid damages,” he said. “To get that kind of verdict, you’ve got to find some state claim not subject to the caps,” he said.

To seek higher damages, in addition to FMLA, Schultz sued his employer under an Illinois statute for intent to inflict emotional distress. State claims of emotional distress in employment matters are very hard to pursue, admits Siedlecki. “They almost never survive summary judgment.” [Note: Read law professor Yamada's essay in .pdf format on the limitations of current U.S. law in bullying-related cases and the stiff requirements to prevail in emotional distress cases like this one.]

Siedlecki said he won’t be surprised if the verdict is reduced. “The 7th Circuit is pretty conservative,” he said.

2006 Note: The verdict was appealed and a settlement of an undisclosed amount was paid.

Jury found Dr. Raess guilty of battery, awarded plaintiff Doescher $325,000

Expert witness:  Dr. Gary Namie, WBI

Appellate Court reversal

2008 Indiana Supreme Court restoral of trial verdict and award for plaintiff

Read the entire story and view the Supreme Court hearing

A City (London) worker has won £800,000 in damages from Deutsche Bank in a landmark workplace bullying case. The award is said by legal experts to be particularly high and likely to be appealed.

High Court judge Justice Owen said that the campaign at the secretariat division of the international banking firm Deutsche Bank Group Services (UK) Ltd. against Helen Green involved a “relentless campaign of mean and spiteful behaviour designed to cause her distress” that left Green on some occasions crying silently at her desk. She worked there from 1997 to 2001.

Owen awarded her a total of $1.5 million for pain and suffering and loss of past and future earnings. He also ordered the bank to pay her legal costs, beginning with an interim payment of $650,000.

The largest part of the award is the £640,000 awarded for future loss of earnings and a pension, and it is this portion which marks the case out as unusual.

“We have seen cases like this before a number of times but the court has awarded such a large amount because it took the view that this person would not be able to work at this salary level for a long time in the future,” said Tom Potbury, a lawyer specialising in employment law at Pinsent Masons.

Green, 36, had said she was subjected to “offensive, abusive, intimidating, denigrating, bullying, humiliating, patronizing, infantile and insulting words and behavior” and subjected to crude and lewd comments from her former colleagues. Her colleagues would move her papers, hide her post and remove her from document circulation lists. She alleged that some of the colleagues had ignored and excluded her, that her personal and professional authority was undermined, and her workload increased to unreasonable and arbitrary levels.

Her lawyer said medical experts on both sides of the case agreed that Green developed a major depressive disorder, but there was disagreement about its cause.

Deutsche Bank said it had not breached its duties to Green and denied that she was bullied, saying she had had a predisposition to mental illness. Deutsche Bank paid for stress counselling and assertiveness training for Green but she had a nervous breakdown before returning to work and suffering a relapse.

“The best way for companies to deal with workplace bullying is to have a clear policy in place and to make sure that employees know about it,” said Potbury. “The policy then has to be enforced. If someone complains it is important that the employer does not sweep it under the carpet,” he said. “That is the best way of protecting yourself against claims. You can better defend yourself if you can show that you have done everything you can.”

Green said she was delighted by the ruling, adding that she had learned bullying was a problem throughout London’s financial world. “My case was not an isolated one,” she said. “At the trial the court heard evidence about other victims. Not only does Deutsche Bank have to put its house in order, but all City (finance) businesses will have to do more than pay lip-service to this hidden menace.”

A Deutsche Bank statement said that “No decision about whether to appeal has been made at this stage”.

Part of Green’s case was argued under the Protection from Harassment Act, a 1997 anti-stalker law that is beginning to be used in employment cases. A House of Lords ruling last month permitted its use in employment cases, and the law differs substantially from existing employment legislation.

“I don’t think anyone imagined when the law was made that it would be used against employers,” said Potbury. “Employers have no real defence against this law. If an employee is harassed at work on more than one occasion they can be liable and there is nothing they can do about it.”

In the case on which the Lords ruled, the NHS (National Health Service) was vicariously liable for the harassment of employee William Majrowski, even though it was not guilty of causing the behaviour or of failing to prevent it. Previously, employees had to prove that the employer had been negligent in preventing bullying, but that is no longer the case.

Though the award will concern other City financial institutions, Potbury said that the problem of bullying at work was very real but very widespread. “It is a problem, but it is not confined to City firms. People get bullied at work everywhere, though the City is a higher stress culture than other workplaces,” he said. “This will make other City firms make sure they are doing everything they can to avoid this.”

Dr. Emelise Aleandri was one of two victorious plaintiffs in a lawsuit against City University of New York. Her bully, Joseph Scelsa, degraded this professional woman, stole her creative works and subjected her to humiliation at an institution of higher education in such a way that Dr. Gary Namie, expert witness in the case, described his outrageous conduct as the worst he had read about nationally. Scelsa treated Aleandri as a worthless person. Obviously, there is a different, objective realistic way to characterize the accomplished woman.

Read about Dr. Aleandri’s lawsuit against the City University of New York (CUNY) that settled for $1.4 million.

Emelise Aleandri, Ph.D.
2005 Woman of Distinction Award
Queens, New York

Dr. Emelise Aleandri has been selected as a Queens Woman of Distinction for 2005. The New York State Senate’s “Woman of Distinction” program was created in 1998 as part of the State’s celebration of Women’s History Month. Past honorees included 19th Century suffragists and women accomplished in sciences, academics, business and the arts. In addition to historic figures, the Women of Distinction program also honors exemplary present day women throughout New York State whose singular professional or personal achievements, whose commitment to excellence, accomplishments and dedicated service on behalf of their communities merit them special recognition by the State Senate.

Dr. Emelise Aleandri is the Artistic Director of Frizzi & Lazzi The Olde Time Italian-American Music & Theatre Company which recreates 19th century immigrant entertainments. She has a Ph.D in Theatre and is President of the Metro NY Chapter of the American Italian Historical Association. Arcadia published her photographic histories, The Italian-American Immigrant Theatre of New York City and Little Italy, about which she regularly lectures for many community organizations. She also lectures through the New York Council for the Humanities. She is currently at work on a multi-volume history of the Italian immigrant theatre for Edwin Mellen Press. She was the 2001 recipient of the Elena Lucrezia Cornaro award from the Order Sons of Italy in America, the 2002 recipient of the Leone di San Marco Award from the Italian Heritage & Culture Committee, and the ETTA Theatre Awardee in 2000.

Dr. Aleandri has produced three documentaries: Teatro, Festa and Circo Rois. For ten years she was the Producer/Host of Italics: The Italian-American Magazine, a nationally-aired cable TV show and is now an independent producer at the Manhattan Neighborhood network. A singer, folk dancer, TV and film actress, Emelise created the role of the 19th century Italian actress, Eleonora Duse, opposite Lilianne Montevecchi’s Sarah Bernhardt in Penguins and Peacocks. She was also featured in Spike Lee’s films Crooklyn and Summer of Sam, the Walnut Street Theatre production of Italian Funerals and Other Festive Occasions, Festa Primavera at La Mama ETC and the Off-Broadway production of Lou La Russo’s Sweatshop. Next, she will sing and play the tricchabalaccha and sing in the chorus of prostitutes in a recording of Jane House Productions’ musical Via Toledo by Night. On May 28 Emelise and Arnie “Mig” Migliaccio presented a program on Farfariello for Bella Italia Mia at the Paolucci Conference Center, 68-02 Metropolitan Avenue in Middle Village, Queens.

MERRITT – A former Merritt RCMP officer has been awarded almost $1 million in damages after harassment by her commanding officer caused her to become clinically depressed and led to her quitting the force.

It is believed to be the highest harassment award made against the RCMP by a Canadian court, said Kamloops lawyer Barry Carter, who argued the case for ex-Mountie Nancy Sulz.

Sulz said Monday she’s still in shock from the award, but “no amount of money could replace the career that was taken away from me.”

“I had always wanted to be a police officer since I was a child. But I can’t do that work anymore. This whole thing has taken 10 years of my life. It’s been tough on my family and my friends,” she said.

Kamloops B.C. Supreme Court Justice George Lamperson awarded Sulz a total of $950,000 in damages, lost wages and loss of future earnings after finding Staff Sgt. Donald Smith and two subordinate officers caused Sulz “serious psychological harm.”

The RCMP has 30 days in which to appeal.

Lamperson ruled that Smith breached his duty by failing to ensure Sulz could work in a harassment-free environment as set out in RCMP regulations.

However, while the officer’s conduct was unreasonable and insensitive, there was no evidence he “deliberately set out to harass the plaintiff and drive her from the RCMP”, said the judge, who found Smith’s old school management style no longer acceptable.

“Although his manner was abrupt, demanding and unfeeling, his actions were consistent with his experience of the paramilitary command structure of the RCMP. It is clear, especially in light of the establishment and dissemination of a specific harassment policy that this command style was no longer appropriate in the modern RCMP,” Lamperson said.

Sulz said the ruling should be a wake-up call to the RCMP.

“I lost my job because I had a baby. I’m sure I’m not the only female member that’s had this happen to them. I complained twice [to superiors] because I wanted to keep working, but nothing happened,” she said.

Sulz joined the RCMP in 1988 and was in the Merritt detachment when Smith took command in 1994. At the time, she was contemplating a full career in the force, she testified.

Sulz testified her troubles began in 1994 when she was on medical leave due to complications from her second pregnancy. While off work she went on a shopping trip to Bellingham (home of the Workplace Bullying & Trauma Institute) without obtaining Smith’s permission.

She said she didn’t realize she had violated policy but was told by Sgt. Ron Angel that he and Smith were annoyed at what she had done and she would have to pay the price.(An RCMP inspector testified that this policy was not well known and has since been discontinued.)

When she returned to work she found that auxiliary constables were instructed not to ride with her because she was said to be manipulative and afraid of the dark. Because of the way she was being treated, her physical and mental health deteriorated, she lost nine kilograms (20 pounds), was constantly on the verge of tears and was unable to sleep.

In 1995, an RCMP psychologist recommended she work only part time. She was diagnosed as having major depressive disorder in February 1996 and told to take sick leave.

The psychologist then received an angry phone call from Smith suggesting that Sulz might have a drug-dependency problem, something he reported to RCMP headquarters, she said.

In 1997, “E” Division headquarters began a formal investigation into Sulz’s 48 complaints against Smith and found five allegations were founded, two could not be determined and the rest unfounded — based on the fact that it was her word against his and there was no corroborating evidence.

The findings came out in 1998 after Smith had left the force. Asked what she would do if any of her children wanted to join the RCMP she said: “I’d have my son pursue it, but I’d be very iffy about the girls.”

DAMAGE AWARD:
Here is how the almost $1 million in damages, lost wages and loss of future earnings was awarded:
$125,000, General damages
$600,000, Future wage loss
$225,000, Past wage loss
Total: $950,000

$119,957 — 2004 arbitration won by Northcutt
$225,000 — 2005 settlement won by Northcutt
$60,475 (est.) 10 years district contribution to her retirement
$35,200 (est.) 10 years health and welfare benefits for Northcutt
$104,956 — district legal expenses, all designed to enable bullying without consequences

$545,588 the total expense for ONE bully principal and 3 supportive district personnel !!!

How much harm and expense does a bully have to inflict before the wise employer decides to end the bullying? It’s not only the right thing to do, it’s the fiscally responsible thing to do. There are likely other cases just like this in the District. The Vallejo School Board should demand accountability for these losses or lose their elected seats themselves.

While some state laws require schools to curb bullying among students, all states currently allow unscrupulous bullying administrators to attack teachers with impunity. Stopping student bullying stands no chance until the work environment in which student learning ostensibly takes place is purged of abusers.

There are ways to correct and prevent expensive bullies. See the Work Doctor Blueprint for a Bullying-Free Workplace. Teachers deserve a safe and healthy workplace, too. Bullied Teacher Wins $225,000
Bully Principal and District Supporters Costs Employer Over $545,000 Total!

Teacher Settles Lawsuit with VCUSD for $225,000
By Sarah Rohrs and Kenneth Brooks
Vallejo (CA) Times-Herald
Feb. 13, 2006

A Vallejo (CA) High School teacher who sued State Administrator Richard Damelio and other district officials for alleged harassment, discrimination and retaliation has agreed to an out-of-court settlement.

In a court document signed Dec. 2, the Vallejo City Unified School District agreed to pay veteran teacher Vernetta Northcutt $225,000 stemming from emotional distress damages associated with the civil lawsuit.

The settlement was obtained through a written request to the school district.

The district also agreed to pay her regular salary through June 30, and pay on her behalf 10 years and six months of service to the California State Teachers’ Retirement System. A 20-year teacher earns a base salary of $66,757, and a 23-year teacher, $68,528. The district pays 8.825 percent of her salary annually for retirement.

Further, the district agreed to pay Northcutt’s health and welfare benefits for 10 years. Under the new health benefit cap that went into effect for employee groups this year, the district pays 80 percent of costs, which comes to $4,400 for a teacher with single coverage.

For her part, Northcutt agreed to be placed on paid administrative leave Dec. 17, and resign from her job. Under the settlement terms, she cannot seek employment in the school district. A confidentiality agreement prevents Northcutt and district officials from talking about the settlement. The confidentiality portion of the agreement allows the district to seek fines of $15,000 against Northcutt should she breach the clause. The agreement also restricts district officials from what they can say about why Northcutt left her position.

The settlement brings to an end a 3 1/2-year legal battle which has cost the school district $104,956 in legal fees, according to district records. Those legal fees are in addition to the December $225,000 settlement, plus $119,197 Northcutt received as a result of a 2004 arbitration award.

In her October civil lawsuit, Northcutt alleged district officials failed to honor a previous arbitration award and punished her for complaining.

She was seeking compensation for emotional distress and back wages denied when her sick leave was cut off, as well as punitive damages, civil penalties, and injunctions against harassment, discrimination and retaliation.

In February 2004, an arbitrator found that Vallejo High School Principal Phil Saroyan racially discriminated against Northcutt when he transferred her to another classroom. She received $70,000 for emotional distress, $41,322 in attorneys’ fees and $7,875 in back pay. She was also reinstated to her previous teaching assignment.

The district appealed the award to the Solano County Superior Court where judges sided with Northcutt. An appeal of that ruling was pending in the state Court of Appeal when the settlement was signed.

Besides Damelio and Saroyan, the recent suit also named Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Rose Peppin, and Director of Compliance and Community Services Karen Hansen. In 2004, when the arbitrator originally ruled in Northcutt’s favor, Assistant Superintendent Kevin Hanks told the Times-Herald that the arbitrator “overstepped her bounds,” and that claims of racial discrimination by Saroyan were “unfounded.”

In June 2002, Saroyan reassigned Northcutt, a 20-year district veteran with tenure, from 12th grade government and English to 10th grade world history, a grade and subject she had never taught before. The move violated the district’s collective bargaining agreement. Northcutt alleged it was racially motivated.

In a 2004 interview with the Times-Herald, Northcutt said Saroyan gave her reasons for the original reassignment, including a high student failure rate. However, the arbitrator found her class had the second lowest failure rate in her department.

In the 2004 interview, Hanks acknowledged “there were concerns regarding complaints and the number of transfers in and out of her classroom.” He added that Northcutt wasn’t the only Vallejo High teacher reassigned that year.

Rather than uphold the arbitrator’s award, Northcutt alleged that the district tried to demote her to a substitute teacher, and singled her out for her pursuit of discrimination claims.

Joseph Doescher and Daniel Raess worked side by side in the operating room at St. Francis Hospital in Beech Grove, Indiana. Doescher and the other perfusionists often had to put up with yelling, swearing, and belittling comments from Raess, the heart surgeon. Finally, Doescher reported the behavior to his supervisor. Raess got wind of it and retaliated.

In subsequent court proceedings, Doescher described looking up at Raess’ red face and popping veins. He was afraid Raess was going to hit him. In the end, Doescher left his job with a debilitating case of depression. Later, he sued Raess and was awarded $325,000 in compensatory (but not punitive) damages.

Shortly after the Indiana Supreme Court decided this high-profile medical case, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) issued a safety alert, requiring hospitals to adopt a zero-tolerance policy toward workplace bullying.

By January 2009, hospitals must also comply with the new disruptive behavior standard (LD.3.15). They will create new training, post a code of conduct for employees, and set up a mechanism for workers to report inappropriate outbursts.

“It’s been widely recognized that this kind of behavior goes on in health care settings,” says Peter Angood, MD, Chief Patient Safety Officer for JCAHO. “It seemed to be increasing in frequency, so we felt it was important to put standards in place.”

Perfect Targets

Researchers, including Gerald Hickson, MD, at Vanderbilt University, and Alan H. Rosenstein, MD, have shown how inappropriate workplace behavior can lead to increased legal costs and put patient safety at risk. Other studies have shown that clinicians working in a hostile environment make more errors while dispensing medication.

“If there are people in the workplace who don’t play well with others, sometimes they cause other members of the team to lose focus,” Hickson says, “and an error will occur.”

According to Gary Namie, PhD, Co-founder of the Workplace Bullying Institute in Bellingham, Washington, this issue is coming to the forefront, just as sexual harassment did about 20 years ago. Employers are starting to see training programs and prevention as a good investment. And Namie says the need is great — in all sectors of the work world. WBI and Zogby International conducted a survey and found that 37% of American workers say they have been victims of workplace bullying.

Health care, with its hierarchical structure of authority and caste-like training systems, is rife with this type of negative behavior. In part, Namie says, this is because there are so many caring and compassionate people in the field, who make perfect targets: They would rather help people and keep a low profile than fight back.

“It’s the people mix,” Namie says. “You’ve got just enough people with strong egos and narcissistic personalities. Then you’ve got this vast pool of targets who have an altruistic bent–they want to focus on the work itself, and they have a belief in a benevolent world. They don’t respond to aggression with aggression.”

Workplace bullies usually target a person with good social skills who is well liked, as Namie explains: “It’s usually a person with an established record who poses a threat, and the bully wants to take him or her down.”

Nurses at the Forefront

Frequently, physicians are the aggressors and nurses are the targets. In fact, a JCAHO survey found that 50% of nurses had been targets of this kind of intimidation, and 90% of nurses reported having witnessed it.

Dianne Felblinger, EdD, MSN, WHNP-BC, CNS, RN, a nursing instructor at the University of Cincinnati, believes the nursing shortage is driving some of the frustration–but also may hold the key to solving the problem.

First of all, many hospitals do not have optimal nurse-to-patient ratios right now, due to the shortage. That, in turn, leads to high stress and more confrontations. “I have pretty much seen it all,” Felblinger says. “I have seen yelling, screaming, and chart throwing. I once saw a physician throw a needle, and it pierced the nurse’s skin.”

On the other hand, she adds, the nursing shortage has helped nurses find their voices and ask for better treatment. Hospitals know if they don’t retain their nurses and keep them happy, nurses have a lot of career options these days–and they just might walk.

Felblinger worries about NPs who may be the sole nurse in a clinic, surrounded by physicians. Those NPs could become targets, since they don’t have other nurses to turn to for support.

The best prevention, according to Felblinger, is to speak up right away. Unfortunately, most targets of bullying let the problems continue for as long as two years.

“The most civil thing is to always address it with the person,” Felblinger says. “Get it out in the open, and request that the behavior stop.” It’s about learning to set boundaries and deciding you want to be treated with respect, she adds. “Sometimes things can be worked out really well,” Felblinger says. “Sometimes people don’t realize they’re doing this, because nobody ever brought it to their attention.”

Building Momentum for Change

With the new JCAHO standards in place, clinicians should have an easier time reporting negative incidents.

Still, Namie warns, the JCAHO standards really don’t have teeth. Health care workers won’t truly be protected until legislators pass laws that will cause a workplace bully to lose his or her job (just as they did for sexual harassment). That’s still years away, but with two bills in the New York State Legislature and six other active bills in states across the country, Namie says the movement “continues to catch fire.”

Meanwhile, clinicians who do call out a bully may run into resistance at the top. Bullies are often adept at charming and building allies in high places. Felblinger says that some hospital administrators may also value the money top surgeons or physicians are able to attract to the institution–sometimes more than they value their own workers.

One shining star in this area is Vanderbilt University Medical Center, which has adopted effective prevention policies of its own and shared the model with 40 other hospitals around the country. (For details, visit www.mc.vanderbilt.edu/cppa.)

Vanderbilt uses patient surveys, suggestion cards, and waiting room videos to make it clear to patients that their feedback is welcome. Staff members use an online program to report unprofessional behavior, Hickson says. Once the data are there, the hospital searches for recurring names and patterns of negative behavior. Clinicians who are repeatedly mentioned must then go through training programs and, in certain cases, counseling through an employee assistance program.

It’s not as simple as printing up a statement about zero tolerance, Hickson says. “So many people think you can slap a policy on this and make it go away,” he adds. In fact, it can take years to make inroads and establish civil behavior as a core value for a medical institution.

For Patients and Clinicians

Clinical nurse specialist Theresa Mulherin, MSN, RN, CEN, is in charge of implementing the new JCAHO standards for workplace behavior at Sentara Careplex in Hampton, Virginia. At times, she feels as if she is operating in uncharted territory, but she is also honored to do this job.

“I’m excited about this,” Mulherin says. “As nurses, we’ve known for a long time that this needed to be addressed. This is about patient safety, and that’s why it’s so important to me.”

While it may be a far from perfect world for health care workers, it’s important not to lose heart. Clinicians need to stick together, support each other, and really work on this cause, Felblinger says: “We can lose some of our best and brightest if we don’t deal with it.”